


verlieren und gewinnen

by bytheinco_nstantmoon



Series: auflösungen von unsicherheit [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Making Out, Sad with a Happy Ending, the one where oliver finds out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-03 03:06:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17275919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bytheinco_nstantmoon/pseuds/bytheinco_nstantmoon
Summary: "You were talking about avoiding me, weren't you?"-Oliver finds out in an abandoned practice room.-[Companion fic/Sequel to nachtrauern]





	verlieren und gewinnen

“Percy!” Came the exclamation, and Oliver appeared out of the crowd. Percy felt his insides wilt, but outwardly he simply gave a stiff nod. “I didn’t see you on the train, mate,” Oliver continued, and Percy nodded again, his features remaining disinterested. Oliver’s smile faded. “You okay? You seem a bit…” he didn’t finish, but they both knew what he was thinking.

_Dismissive. Arrogant. Cold._

“Should I leave you alone?”

Percy stepped from the flow of the people to the side of the hall, and Oliver followed him. “I think,” Percy began, forcing his eyes to be flat and his voice neutral, “it would be for the best if you left me alone, yes. Don’t associate with me for a bit.”

“How long is a bit?” Oliver asked, and Percy thought he saw something like desperation in the other boy’s eyes. He looked away.

“Forever,” he replied stiffly. “Forever is a safe bet.”

He sat alone at the feast and pretended that Oliver’s loud laughter a couple feet down the table wasn’t forced. His leg bounced up and down the entire time, his fingernails digging painfully into his palms- normally Oliver would discreetly lay a hand on his knee and whisper, “It’s okay, Perce, lay your hands flat against mine, please,” to help Percy’s heart rate go back to normal. But Percy supposed that he had just given that up, hadn’t he?

That night, he got back second, and Oliver was awake. They were the only two Gryffindor boys in their year, so there were no witnesses to the way Oliver’s face collapsed when Percy pulled shut the curtains around his bed. “So, uh, not tonight?” He asked weakly, referring to the habit of sharing a bed that they’d begun at the end of fifth year.

“No, Oliver,” Percy replied, and his voice was condescending. “Not tonight.”

Percy found that living life cut off from Oliver was the hardest bloody experience he’d ever put himself through. He wanted to grab Oliver’s hands and apologize, beg to go back to before, when Oliver would play with his hair and smile at him and neither of them were cold at night. But Oliver’s smiles toward him were non-existent now; Percy knew that what he had done was cruel. Oliver wasn’t going to forgive him, as well he shouldn’t; but this was for the best.

In Transfiguration one day, when the class period was dragging on and on, Percy could feel something burning into him. He turned his head and was caught by Oliver’s glare- he had never seen the other boy so mad, and certainly not at him. His leg started up again, and he looked away hurriedly, his breath coming in short. His shaky fingers fumbled for his quill and he grasped it, bringing it under his desk and stabbing the sharp point into his thigh. His quills were charmed not to dull, so he did it again and again and again, trying to dispel the awful way his throat was closing up.

“Professor McGonagall?” Someone asked suddenly.

“Yes, Wood?” She replied briskly, looking over her glasses at him. Oliver lowered his hand.

“I’m feeling a bit lightheaded, m’am, like I might pass out. Can someone help me to the Infirmary?”

“Yes, yes, of course, please take care of yourself. You have a game in two days, Wood.”

Oliver dipped his head. “I’m aware, m’am.” He stood and came to Percy’s desk, dropping a hand on his shoulder. “Help me?” He whispered, and Percy couldn’t very well refuse.

They walked in silence for all of two minutes before Oliver stopped and grabbed Percy’s elbow. “Look, Percy,” he began, “I know we’re not really friends anymore-” Percy cringed like he’d been slapped.

“Is that what we were?” He asked wryly, and Oliver sighed.

“We never said we were anything else. But that’s not the point. I saw what you were doing to yourself in there, Perce, with the quill and all, and- I know I can’t help you anymore, but uh-” he breathed out a long breath. “I was your best friend for five years, so promise me you won’t… hurt yourself? In honor of what we used to be.”

Percy hesitated, because he’d recently found pain to be an excellent source of focus for a scattered mind, but he eventually pursed his lips and nodded. “Fine.”

“Thank you,” Oliver replied. “Go back to class, you’ll be furious if you miss the notes.”

Percy could stay with Oliver, get the notes from someone else, but if he looked at those eyes any longer he was going to cry, so instead he nodded silently and returned to class. He could hardly focus, and McGonagall gave him odd looks throughout the period.

He thought about not going to the game. Really, he did. But in the end, he couldn’t- he just couldn’t. He refused to dwell on why.

Oliver played well- he played wonderfully well, but his performance was slightly lacklustre, slightly off. It was the kind of decline you only noticed if you had his every move memorized, and Percy couldn’t help but feel concerned. Surely it had nothing to do with him, because surely Oliver wouldn’t allow an errant relationship to interfere with Quidditch- the sport was his life, was his everything.

They won anyhow, of course.

Percy went to congratulate the twins, and they grabbed him by the elbows, pulling him toward the castle.

“Even you’re going to have fun tonight, Perce,” Fred told him, and George burst out laughing.

“He’ll turn us all in before he drinks a drop,” he replied, and Percy scowled at them both, opening his mouth to protest being manhandled, but then everyone flooded around them, pushing them through the halls. He pulled himself from the twins’ grip eventually, and pushed through a door, stumbling into a darkened stairwell. He cleared his throat and straightened, breathing out.

“You’re avoiding it all too?” Someone asked, and there was Oliver Wood, a couple steps below him, looking up at him. Percy stared back, and then swallowed hard and nodded.

“I’m talented at avoiding things,” he answered softly, and Oliver snorted derisively, crossing his arms across his chest.

“I’ve noticed.” There was awkward silence for a minute, and then Oliver licked his lips and stepped up a step and spoke again. “Why’d you start avoiding me?”

Percy hesitated. “It’s complicated, Ollie, I-”

“Don’t give me that bullshit,” Oliver snapped, and Percy flinched. “What the fuck happened? You were-” He stopped and shook his head. “You were my best friend, and for a couple months I thought you might be my boyfriend, and then-” he looked up at him again, and Percy’s heart lurched at the sight of tears in his eyes. “Then one day you just stopped replying to my letters. Not even one to blow me off, just silence, and I get back to school and my boyfriend or whatever the fuck bloody hates me and-” He paused and drew in a shaky breath. “I fucking hate crying, Weasley. Damn you.”

Percy was silent for a long moment. “I _was_ your boyfriend,” he said finally, and Oliver scoffed.

“Good, then there’s one more breakup on the list.”

“I-” Percy’s voice failed him. “Ollie, I don’t hate you. I don’t.” He stepped down so that they were closer. “I don’t hate you,” he repeated. “I don’t hate what we- we did. I don’t hate that you were my boyfriend. I miss it so much, Ollie, but I can’t be with you-”

“That’s bullshit,” Oliver replied. His voice was cold. “You could be with me if you bloody well wanted to be.”

“I can’t,” Percy snapped. “I’ve only seen you cry four times, Oliver, four times in five years of living together, and all four were because of me. I don’t want to hurt you-”

“If you didn’t want to hurt me you wouldn’t have cut me off-”

“I’m trying to help you, dammit-”

“Breaking my heart is helpful?”

“After what I did-”

“I need you, why can’t you see that-”

“I-”

Before another excuse can be made, Oliver had Percy’s shirt collar in his hand and they were kissing. Percy stepped down so that they were on the same step and leaned into it, slipping his arms into the familiar place around Oliver’s waist. Oliver let go of his collar and wound his fingers into Percy’s hair, pulling him closer and exhaling a long breath. The kiss wasn’t violent or angry or accusing- it was soft. It was an apology.

“I’m sorry,” Percy mumbled as they separated. “I was trying to-”

“I know,” Oliver interrupted, carding his fingers through Percy’s hair. “I won’t say I’m not angry, but I know.” Percy nodded and leaned his head forward onto Oliver’s shoulder.

“It’s late,” he mumbled. Oliver nodded. “They’ll pull you into all the celebration if we go back.”

Oliver kissed his hair. “You’re right.”

Percy tightened his grip on Oliver’s waist. “I don’t want them to,” he complained. “I want you to myself right now.” Oliver laughed quietly.

“Filch will catch us if we stay in the stairwell like this,” he pointed out. “Come on.”

He pulled Percy down the stairs, the two of them staying as silent as they possibly could, before pushing open a door and entering the Quidditch practice room that no one ever really used. Percy closed the door quietly and cast a locking charm, followed by a _silencio_.

“Oh, we need a silencing charm?” Oliver asked, and Percy smacked him gently on the arm. “I’m kidding, baby,” he said with a laugh, and the redhead’s fair lit up with a blush. “Come here, I want to kiss you more.”

It’s deeper this time, fierier, and Oliver pushed him back against the door, his arms on either side, caging him in. Percy’s arms slip around Oliver’s neck, and it’s intense and perfect and god, how he’s missed this. Oliver’s hands slid down his sides, settling on his hips, and he couldn’t repress a small whimper. Oliver pulled away for a second to laugh at him, and Percy just smiled, too overwhelmed to be embarrassed.

“I love you,” he whispered, because it’s true, and Oliver leaned forward and kissed him again.

“Good. Don’t leave me again.”

“Never,” Percy promised, and he was aware what a right idiotic choice it was to promise he would never leave- he was sixteen, for heaven’s sake, and they had such different plans for their lives- but he didn’t care in the least, because he meant it, he really did. “I’m sorry.”

“It’ll be okay,” Oliver murmured in his ear, and then he was kissing down his neck and there were no more words to say anymore. Oliver’s hands were everywhere- touching him, pulling him, overwhelming him, and it was all so perfect. Somehow Oliver lost his shirt, neither recalling exactly how it happened, and Percy’s was unbuttoned, revealing his chest. In the back of his mind, there was a thought of panic, but he was too distracted with Oliver’s hands, Oliver’s lips, to process why he was panicking, until Oliver pushed his shirt from his shoulders and his arms were bare and all at once he _remembered._

He shoved Oliver off of him, panting, and crossed his arms tightly over his stomach, hiding his marred forearms. Not now, not here- this couldn’t be happening.

“Perce?” Oliver questioned, stepping closer again. His eyes were uneasy. “Did I hurt you or something? What happened?”

“You didn’t hurt me,” Percy replied; he found he couldn’t look Oliver in the eyes. “I’m alright.”

“Why are you crossing your arms like that, baby?” Percy stared at the floor. Not now. Not here. “Percy?” Oliver reached out tentatively, and Percy flinched away.

Silence.

“Percy,” Oliver began slowly, “earlier, when we were arguing in the stairwell, you said “after what I did”. You were- you were talking about avoiding me, weren’t you?” Percy just crossed his arms tighter and closed his eyes. _“Weren’t you?”_ Oliver asked again, his voice desperate, choked. 

Slowly, Percy shook his head. “What did you do?” Oliver’s voice was fragile.

“I’m sorry,” Percy whispered in lieu of an answer. “I love you.”

“What did you do?”

“Oliver-”

Oliver grabbed him by the shoulders, pushing him back against the door- not rough, not to hurt him, just to get his attention. “Percival Weasley,” he ground out, his eyes dark, “What in _fuck’s name did you do to yourself?”_

Percy’s heart hammered in his throat. “I-”

Silence.

Then he unfolded his arms and offered them out, the scars in full view. He watched Oliver’s face- he expected disgust, he expected anger, but instead the taller boy’s features crumpled completely, plummeting into an awful mixture of fear and heartache that Percy never wanted to see again.

“You-” Oliver reached out and pulled Percy close to him; his breathing was ragged. He was crying again. “Goddammit, Weasley,” he choked out, and buried his face in his boyfriend’s (was he? He hoped so, but now wasn't the time.) hair. “I love you.” He repeated it, again and again. “I love you, Perce. I love you.”

Percy is crying too, shaking against his shoulder, and his heart broke more with every muffled sob. “I love you, Oliver,” he replied, his voice disturbingly small. “I’m sorry.”

Oliver didn’t ask why. He knew why- he knew Percy felt incompetent, felt unwanted in even his own family. He knew he was anxious over every small detail because he was so damn convinced that he had to be perfect to matter. And Oliver tried to convince him otherwise, but he had no clue how he was meant to go about doing it.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered back, because he felt that he needed to apologize too. Percy is his everything, his best friend and his partner and he _loves him._

Percy had tried to kill himself.

Percy had tried-

Oliver shuddered violently. “Thank you,” he murmured. “Thank you for being here. I- God, Perce, it would’ve killed me.” Percy nodded against his shoulder and stifled another sob. “Can you promise me, baby?” he whispered. “Promise you won’t try that again?”

Percy hesitated for a whole three seconds; the most awful three seconds Oliver had ever lived through. Then he nodded and pulled back to say, “Yes, Ollie, I promise.”

It wasn’t enough. His voice was too flat, his hesitation too long- Oliver grasped his wrists and said, “I love you, Percy, alright? I love you so bloody much. I couldn’t stand it if I lost you, baby. Promise me, Perce- please, please promise me.”

Precy leaned in and kissed him once- soft, sweet. “I promise, Ollie. I’m sorry, I promise.”


End file.
